Christopher D. Junker 2006-09-29

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

Occasionally interesting anecdotes about neurosurgical residency sprinkled throughout a compilation of tedious musings mostly along the lines of, gosh I'm a brain surgeon, and all my friends are brain surgeons, we can explain everything and save the world. Some of her remarks on the mind were somewhat reminiscent of conversations I have heard among enthusiasts of The Matrix. The last chapter is especially embarrassing.

Hoodlum 2006-09-29

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

The Times Literary Supplement had this to say in its Sept. 15, 2006, number:

"Initially it's hard to pin down exactly why [Firlik's] thoughtless and cliched anecdotes are so insufferable.... [T]he source of the real chill gradually becomes apparent. It is Firlik's conviction of her own superiority, and her misguided overestimation of her dull, workplace thoughts. At the end of Brain Matters, she invites us to marvel with her at the superlative intelligence of a group of her colleagues. 'What might be accomplished,' she asks, awed at the qualities of people like herself, 'if the same group lent some of their collective brain power to, say, improving public education or homeland security?'"